I
had been socking away savings and inching toward choosing a mason contractor
to do the brickwork when one morning I walked out to go to work and noticed
what you see in the photo at left. The bricks had started falling out of
the wall.

Now, I bought this house
knowing that it needed major brickwork. Got a few thousand knocked off the
price as a result of hiring an excellent house inspector and standing my
ground with the previous owners during negotiation time. So actually getting
it done should have been a relief, right? Ha.

Severe foreshadowing
should have resulted from the contractor who drove up to give an estimate
in his white Mercedes convertible, which he left double-parked in front
of my house while he was here. His estimate was way too low to actually
include fixing anything.

Then there was the company
from the burbs, which would prbly have done a tip-top job but would have
cost me a year's salary. So we went with a guy whose estimate was at the
high end of the middle and who sounded like he really knew what was going
on.

Below is the view out
my kitchen window while the work was going on. My kitchen is on the second
floor. I was not used to seeing guys outside my window while making coffee.

I have a lot to say
about the whole contractor experience. But in the interest of having a relaxed
evening and maybe finishing these pages this year, I'm not going to get
into it now. E-mail me if you want to hear more.

This job included tuckpointing
of all the show brick. Which called for scaffolding all over the place.
Which was annoying when it stayed there for months on end, even though it
was supposed to be gone and the job done. But this did allow me to strip
and refinish the old painted wood moldings around the windows. Much more
lovely than the aluminum stuff that was slapped up to make the place more
white and easy. White and easy is just not my style.

And
as you can prbly tell, scraping the old paint off of here was not too easy.
Not only old and multi-layered but leaded and quite stubborn. The wood underneath
was just beautiful, though. I almost wished I could just stain and varnish
it like inside woodwork.

By the way, what's weird
about the photo at left is that all the yellow detail brick is removed.
The common building brick is ringing the window frame.

After the tuckpointing,
lots of red mortar stains were left on the sidewalk. Mr. X doesn't mind,
though.

And I ended up with
dark-violet moldings, which I love, but the Mexican woman who walked by
said it was the color of death. She preferred the fuschia-colored primer
that was up for a few weeks before I painted. And I thought that primer
color would drive down the property values. Go figger.